The invention relates to apparatus for converting gaseous or liquid fuel energy to mechanical and/or electrical energy.
The apparatus is based on the observation by the inventor that a plasma formed of hot burning gases can be turned into a double vortex with one part of the vortex rotating in an outer cylindrical stratum of a rapidly rotating, axially moving plasma mass, which by suitable means as explained in more detail in the present disclosure, can be formed into a double vortex having an inner vortex rotating in a cylindrical stratum inside the aforesaid outer cylindrical stratum, and wherein the gas plasma in the inner vortex is rotating at considerably greater speed of rotation in the same rotational direction as the outer vortex, but in opposite axial direction. The process of turning the outer vortex into itself, so to speak, has been named a "sustained implosion", which term shall be used in the following description, which discloses energy converting apparatus based on the principle of sustained implosion technology.
To more readily understand the phenomenon of sustained implosion it should be understood that a sustained implosion is formed by injecting, by suitable means, hot burning gases into a cylindrical chamber, in the following termed an exhaust chamber, in such a manner that the burning, still expanding gases enter one end of the cylindrical exhaust chamber in an outer spiral-shaped trajectory following the inward facing surface of the chamber. The burning gases are reflected from an opposite suitably curved end wall of the chamber, to again traverse the chamber in an inner spiral-shaped trajectory moving axially in opposite direction of the outer trajectory. Due to the continued combustion of the burning gases, the temperature increases as gases keep expanding while at the same time the rotational speed of the gases increase considerably. Due to the high rotational velocity and the resulting radial gravity gradient, the hot burning plasma separates with its lighter particles concentrating at the axis of the exhaust chamber and the heavier particles at its perimeter. The separation of the lighter and heavier particles also create opposite electrical polarities resulting in an electric charge of one polarity forming on the cylindrical wall of the combustion chamber and an electrical charge of the opposite polarity forming on conducting structures disposed along the axis of the cylindrical wall. These charges can be tapped off by suitable conducting means and converted to usable electric power in a power converter.
The sustained implosion in the form of highly heated, high velocity imploding vortex combustion is further enhanced by ionizing the fuel within an ionizing chamber prior to combustion. The ionizing chamber is located at the center of the vortex. The combustion chamber is constructed so as to stratify all molecular and atomic particles by particle mass. The flow patterns operate to trap the heavier particles in the very hot pressure regions so as to force them into giving up their kinetic energy in their inertial mass before they escape from the system, and then to return these lighter gases to a low pressure in the central core that subsequently causes a repetition of the cycle. The plasma combustion produces great quantities of free electrons that associate and exchange within the highly heated stratified gas particles in such a manner so as to separate into particles of heavier masses and lighter masses, with the gases containing large quantities of ionized particles, including electrons and small quantities of ionized electrons, stratification by mass and polarization by orbit, and great variation of electrical potentials.
The technology of forming a vortex in a burning mass of gases for the purpose of more intimately mixing fuel and air in order to attain more complete combustion is per se known from the prior art. As examples, U.S. Pat. No. 4,507,075 shows a combustion device using vortex technology to improve the combustion of coal dust. U.S. Pat. No. 4,351,251 shows combustion apparatus with two oppositely moving vortices. U.S. Pat. No. 4,144,019 shows a vortex burner with two vortices separated by an intermediate cylindrical wall, and U.S. Pat. No. 3,958,915 shows a method of burning heavy oil in a two-stage combustion process with exhaust gas recirculation.
None of the prior art, however, shows the use of a double vortex, i.e. a sustained imploding vortex to generate electric energy, nor to be used as an adjunct to a gas turbine to enhance the efficiency of the turbine. It is accordingly an object of the instant invention to provide apparatus in the form of a gas turbine to produce electric energy and/or simultaneously produce shaft energy.